Friday, April 01, 2011

Naan Recipe

Naan is traditionally cooked in a tandoor; our home version uses a grill (broiler).

Makes 10.

Preparation time: about 40 minutes (excludes dough rising time)

We use a 20ml tablespoon and 250ml measuring cup for all of our recipes.

235ml (1 cup minus 3 teaspoons) full cream milk1 teaspoon (5g) sugar1 1/2 teaspoons (5g) instant dried yeast550g (3 2/3 cups) plain flour1 1/2 teaspoons (9g) fine table salt135g (1/2 cup) Greek style natural yoghurt (about 9.7g fat per 100g)1 large egg (we use eggs with a minimum weight of 59g)1 1/2 tablespoons (30ml) oil (we use a mild-flavoured oil, such as sunflower)About 24g (2 tablespoons) flour, to flour work surface when kneading dough1/2 teaspoon (2.5ml) oil, for oiling bowl20g ghee or butterPlace milk in a small saucepan and heat over medium heat until no longer cold, but not more than body temperature (this may only take a few seconds). Remove from heat. If you have accidentally overheated the milk, allow it to cool before using because the yeast will be killed if the milk is too hot. Add sugar and yeast to milk and stir. Set milk mixture aside in a warm place for about 10 minutes.Stir flour and salt together in a large bowl until well combined. Make a well in the centre of the flour and set aside.After about 10 minutes, the milk mixture should have a frothy layer on the top.Add the yoghurt, egg and oil to the milk mixture and stir to combine. Pour into the well in the flour.Combine dough ingredients using a spoon, then use your hands to bring the dough together. The dough should be soft and sticky at this stage.

Lightly flour a clean work surface using some of the reserved flour.Knead dough for about seven minutes, flouring the work surface with more of the reserved flour if the dough starts to stick. The dough should become smooth and elastic. Form dough into a ball.Place the extra 1/2 teaspoon oil in a large bowl. Add the dough and turn dough a couple of times to coat with oil.Cover bowl with a clean damp tea towel to prevent dough drying out. Place bowl in a warm place until dough has doubled in size, about 1 to 1 1/2 hours. The warmer the area the faster the dough will rise.Place a large, heavy duty oven tray in the oven about 10cm below the grill (broiler) — the naan needs space to puff without hitting the grill element.

Preheat grill on high heat.

Using your hand, press down on the dough to remove some of the air. Take one fifth of the dough (about 200 grams) and cover the remaining dough with a clean damp tea towel. Divide the portion of dough into two equal pieces and roll each into a ball. On a clean work surface, use your fingertips or a rolling pin to flatten each ball out to the desired shape about 3-5mm thick.Place the two dough shapes onto the preheated tray. Place under the grill and cook until the naan is puffed with a few brown spots (about 1 1/2 to 2 minutes). Using tongs, flip the naan over and cook for about one minute until lightly browned.

Remove naan from the tray (leave tray under grill to stay hot) and lightly brush the top of each naan with melted ghee or butter.Repeat with the remaining dough.

14 Comments:

The use of the griller to cook the naans is sheer genius. I have been using a very similar recipe for years but that used water in a tray in the bottom of the oven and about 12 minutes on a tray in the top at 200c.

The griller works a treat but because it is imitating a tandoor getting the baking sheet really hot and keeping it that way is critical - learnt by experience yesterday. I also found that they cooked best if they were well back in the oven.

The recipe is delicious, better than the one I was using which is now in rubbish bin.

A slight but tasty variation would be to add about 2 tsps of kalonji (nigella seeds)to the dough mix.

My husband just loves naan bread, but I haven't been brave enough to make it. Thanks to you girls his dream will come true. I'll be giving this a go as non of your reciepies have failed me yet. Thanks heaps for your site, wish me luck! :)

The amount of salt in this recipe is perfect. I have a convection/microwave oven all in one so put them in my oven at 250C on a pizza tile and they only took a couple of minutes before needing to turn them. Absolutely delicious! I too made a rogan josh and they go together like Bert and Pattie. I was so full at the end I could hardly move.

Recipe worked a treat! Canberra winter being what it is at the moment, I had to place the dough beside an oil-fin heater at 20+ degrees C for 3 - 4 hours to get it to rise properly. Great excuse to keep the heater on in the afternoon.

Next time I might try mixing chopped herbs or spices into the dough for a flavoured naan.

How would I go about making cheese naan? A curry takeaway place I go to has cheese naan (they seem to have melted cheese in the middle?) but they're $3 each. This is probably cheaper to make than buying them.